When a user logs in to use a given personal computer system, the operating system running on that computer system establishes a session for that user. Conventional operating systems running on computer systems typically support only one session, regardless of how many monitors and display devices are attached to the computer system or are present in the computer system. Also, conventional computer systems usually provide only one physical console for a user. Generally, in the context of conventional personal computer systems, only one local user can access the computer system at a time.
Technology such as Fast User Switching (FUS) supported by the WINDOWS® XP® operating system, provided by Microsoft Corporation, allows multiple users to access a computer system through respective user accounts. However, FUS does not allow these multiple users to access the computer system simultaneously, and only one user session can be active at a time. In the FUS context, only one user can log-in to the machine at a time, and this user must log out before a second user can log in.
Other technology such as Terminal Services (TS), supported by various versions of the WINDOWS® family of operation systems, allows multiple users to access a computer system concurrently. However, TS is a thin-client solution, and uses a network to connect a host machine to a plurality of terminals on which information is displayed to the users. While the network does enable multiple users to access the host machine concurrently, it can also be a performance bottleneck that constrains the types of applications that the users can run on the terminals. Some applications require real-time, high-bandwidth multi-media capabilities, such as gaming, audio or video streaming, or other types of graphics-intensive applications. For such applications, the performance of a thin-client solution or any other solution involving or deployed over a network may not be entirely satisfactory, because the demands of such applications may exceed the performance capabilities of the network.